


How Long is Forever?

by Trixen



Series: Toujours Vous [2]
Category: Outlander (TV) RPF
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-11
Updated: 2017-08-02
Packaged: 2018-11-30 15:13:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 9,368
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11466201
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Trixen/pseuds/Trixen
Summary: Sequel to 'Through the Looking Glass'.





	1. what Caitriona found there.

 

In the camera's eye, Caitriona can see a long black tunnel, a flicker of movement, like bloodshot starfall. Its lens clicks and whirs, measuring her and following each light change, the girl checking the white balance using thick strips of cardboard. She fancies that it is beckoning her to open her mouth.

 

_Tell us, Caitriona. Tell us your truth._  

 

But what can say? The script is written, isn't it?

 

Over on the wall, beyond the interviewer's chair, there is a mirror. Perhaps it opens to another world, another earth. Perhaps she could fall down the rabbit hole, an unlikely Alice, the air tasting of dirt and forgotten sunshine. Perhaps she'd look up, gaze at the glittering cosmos. If she stepped through, would there be storms, or would the lightning split the sky to reveal a warm morning, a cup of tea on the porch (steam rising from it gently, slowly, like smoke), the skin of her shoulders bare and polished. The smell of water, and reeds and the caws of birds dipping, swooping, ospreys and cranes and the loons with their blood-red throats.

 

The truth is that she feels ill. Hot, like she's coming down with a fever. The truth is that she's remembering a teacher reading her to once, when she was just a girl, sitting on a ratty carpet with the rest of the class. Crossed legs and a wool skirt. She can remember that she'd felt sick then too, like she was getting a blocked nose. And her teacher kept reading, her voice like a scythe through the room, cutting across the bubbles of their daydreams. 

 

_'Oh, you can't help that,' said the Cat: 'we're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad.'_

_'How do you know I'm mad?' said Alice._

_'You must be,' said the Cat, 'or you wouldn't have come here.'_

 

The words had felt like fingers on her spine. She knew there was something dark in them, like the ghosts that haunted her Granny's attic. 

 

_We're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad._

 

"Ready?"

 

Caitriona looks up at the woman holding the sound mic, and nods. Just once. 

 

"Ready."

 

~~

 

**1 year earlier.**

 

_Los Angeles._

 

Her mouth tastes awfully of salt, and she licks her lips with one swipe of her tongue, trying to avoid smearing the pink gloss, the armour. Earlier, she'd stealthily followed a server passing around food. He'd given her a sliver of sourdough toast, layered with honeyed goat cheese and roasted, bursting grapes. They'd looked like amethysts, like bruises. It was so good that she'd almost moaned while chewing. 

 

Normally she wouldn't have eaten at a 'do like this. After all, she's teetering on the kind of heels that make her feel as if she's on a skyscraper, and her dress is a loaner. _Do not fucking stain it,_ Meghan had said firmly. She worked for Burberry and looked perpetually harassed. It was then that she'd pleaded. _Seriously though, you won't?_

 

She heads for a corner, far from the roving photographers. Ducking behind a plant pot that is the size of a small country, she slicks a wet wipe over her mouth and surreptitiously crunches on a mint. She slips the wipe into her clutch and reapplies her lipstick. All in under thirty seconds. _You're getting quite good at this, Balfe_. Her hair she brushes just once (it's no longer a riot of springy curls after all) and re-fastens the clips holding it in place. It's ridiculous to be this nervous, of course it is. 

 

But there's a hot stone where her stomach used to be, and she keeps scanning the crowd. Over and over again. Like a metronome, as consistent and infuriating as the pulse of her heart. 

 

"See anyone ye like back there?"

 

Of course he _would_ sneak up on her. She arranges her expression carefully. Something else she's gotten quite good at over hiatus. Tries to pretend it wasn't just yesterday that she'd seen all the Internet postings. The video of him tossing that girl into a lake of aqua. The Instagram snaps on beaches and beside cars. For some reason, she hasn't been able to picture him in anything but a trucker hat and sleeveless vest since, so it's almost a surprise that he looks so well turned out. So... _clean_?

 

"Not yet," she says blithely and accepts his kiss on her cheek. His lips feel like nothing. "When did you arrive?"

 

"Only a moment ago," he says and smiles. "It's good to see ye, Balfe."

 

"Mmm, I should hope so."

 

"You've changed. Yer hair--"

 

"Tamed."

 

"Like the audition, actually," he says, and if there's any weight to his words - any allusion to their last conversation about Akasha in Culver City - he doesn't show it. His tone is light, breezy. He sounds like a Californian, born with an avocado in his mouth. "I'm not sure which I prefer more though. The Claire curls grew on me."

 

"Thankfully no one gives a toss what you think," she says, not bothering to temper the words with a grin. "They were a pain in the arse. I've asked them to consider wigs next 'round."

 

"Well, ye clean up quite well."

 

"Mmm," she says again. "How've you been?"

 

For the first time, he looks faintly uncomfortable. "Look - about not texting, I'm sorry. I was just a wee bit busy and trying to--"

 

"No apologies necessary, Heughan," she says. "It's not as if we're joined at the hip?"

 

"We used to be, aye?"

 

The quiet words go right through her, like a hook in a fish's neck. "We worked together, not the same thing."

 

His jaw tightens and a muscle jerks in his cheek.  "Ah, like that, is it?"

 

"I'm not angry," she lies. "In fact, I saw some photos and you looked like you were having a grand time. A bit Bieber adjacent with the hats, but--"

 

He smiles, but it's a twist of movement, nothing more. The flash of his white teeth reminds her of a tiger sizing up his prey. "Sounds quite like judging actually, Balfe. Ye might want to work on that."

 

"You might want to work on your taste in clothes. And women." She immediately hates herself for the comment. So raw and ridiculous. "Look--"

 

Sam cuts her off by lifting his hand. "How was New York?"

 

She shrugs her shoulders slightly. "Busy. Busy and not at all what I expected. I suppose I thought I'd just slip back into things like an old dress or something. But it didn't fit-- I mean, my life there just didn't fit? I had a nice time but everything's changed."

 

"Has it?"

 

"For me it has," she says, looking away. Her throat aches. "I knew the show would require a lot from me -- a lot of adjustments, but--"

 

"Only positive changes on this end," Sam says, and his voice has cooled. "It's odd to be suddenly welcomed into places that turned ye away before, but I can't say I mind."

 

"That's not... that's not _real_ , Sam."

 

"And what is?" he asks harshly. "Loch Rannoch? Pretending to be a warrior? Give me a break, Cait. This is what's real. _This_ chance and what we make of it."

 

To hear him say _Loch Rannoch_ in that dismissive way, it undoes her. She feels like he's drawn a zipper down her front, spilled her insides. To think of that silly email she almost sent. Mooning around Manhattan, carrying the cufflinks she'd never given him in her bag. Sometimes, she had brought them out and held them against her breasts, over the throb of her heart. 

 

"You're right of course," she says brightly. "Which is why we should be mingling. With other people."

 

She doesn't wait for a response, though she hears the intake of his breath. The way he swallows and moves aside as she stalks toward the balcony doors. The sleeve of his blazer had brushed her arm. She'd smelled him on the air, and there had still been something that punctured her memories, something that the wild, secret part of her recognized. The smell of wind, and heather, sandalwood and salt.

 

Outside, there's a long, wide swathe of balcony overlooking the city. Palm trees and white-topped buildings. HVAC units and puffing breaths of smog. In the distance, the glimmer of the Pacific, so blue and fathoms deep. She walks over to the railing, and runs her hand down it as she makes her way to the corner, away from the clusters of people. Away from the mingling. She can't stand to face anyone else just yet. Not with her blood hammering in her body and the knowledge that--

 

that

 

_what_?

 

"That everything has changed," she whispers out loud. Only if she says it will it be true. How melodramatic, but if there ever was a time to be maudlin and sore and salt-eyed, it's now. God that _email_. She grabs her phone from her bag. She'd better delete it now, lest she decide to send it in a fit of wine and gin and Donal egging her on (the man liked nothing more than regrettable actions). It's still in her Drafts, sitting forlornly next to a half-written grocery list and a missive to her grandmother she'd forgotten to send, and then couldn't bear to delete after she died.

 

_Sam,_

 

_This feels a bit daft, writing you an email like we’re in sixth form, but we’re not texting (? I don’t really know why but we’re not) so I wasn’t really sure what else to do. I thought about calling but that seemed odd too. It’s like being at uni, and you’re on summer break and you’re not sure how to contact the person you used to chat with all the time at the uni bar or pub in town._

 

_I’m rambling, aren’t I? I just wanted to say I’m sorry._

 

_Properly sorry._

 

_For screwing things up with that bloody awful day at Loch Rannoch. Not that it was AWFUL but telling you how I felt— I mean, admitting things properly was so terrible of me. I’m not sure what I thought I was doing. I just wanted you to know, I suppose. That I did see you that day at Akasha (I know I haven’t said anything about that and I don’t think you want me to?) and I was as flattened by it as anyone could be. I don’t believe in love at first sight, but that felt like something close to it - it felt like seeing someone who you just realize very quickly is a person who could fit into a place you didn’t know was empty._

 

_YES I KNOW THAT SOUNDS DIRTY, HEUGHAN._

 

_But do you also know what I mean?_

 

_You became so much more than a mate to me. You became my best mate, but even that seems so *small* for what it was. All those times you looked at me and just KNEW I needed a coffee. You would come up to me and work out that knot I always get at the back of my neck from the corsets holding me up right. You bought me that book of old postcards. You asked about Eddie every day, without fail. It felt like you truly cared what I had to say about a cat you’ve never even met. You made me laugh so hard I cried and actually snorted a few times too, not my finest hour, but you made my stomach hurt from it. You brought me gin and tried to make me dinner and you made me WANT to make you dinner._

 

_You made me want so many things, Sam._

 

_I never thought, —_

 

_well, I just never thought. I thought I knew, you see. I thought I was smart. I thought I had things together._

 

_And then I moved to Glasgow and I met you and everything seems spinning on a precipice and I’m afraid to fall, I’m afraid._

 

_But I want to tell you that if you’d catch me, I’d fall._

 

_For you. I think I’d do anything._

 

_As sappy as that sounds, it’s true._

 

_It’s so true._

 

_Caitriona_

_xo_

 

Her thumb hovers over the trash button, and then.

 

“I’m an arse, y’know.”

 

She jumps and shoves her phone back in her clutch. “You’re an arse for sneaking up on people, yes.”

 

“Aye, I ken that.” He pauses and leans next to her, looking out over the city. “I didn’t mean to be such a shite though. Earlier. Ye didn’t deserve it and I suppose it just threw me for a loop, seeing you again.”

 

“Why?”

 

He shrugs, laughs. “Well for one thing, ye look very, very different in those glad rags.”

 

“You mean as opposed to wooly, stinky skirts and Canada Goose?”

 

Sam looks down at her, his eyes crinkling. “Exactly. I wasn’t expecting the supermodel to show up.”

 

“I’ve always been a supermodel, Heughan,” she says loftily.

 

He chucks her chin. “That ye have. But it was— it was more of a surprise seeing you after so long. Like a shock to the system.”

 

She feels _that_. Like electricity, sparkling as true as gemstones between them, between their bodies and minds. “So why didn’t you call me then? Text, even? Christ Sam, we were _mates_."

 

Sam looks down at her, those blue eyes blazing. “I just don’t know what ye _want_ from me, Caitriona.”

 

“What do you mean?”

 

He leans back against the rail, crossing his arms. His hair is burnished fire in the dying sunlight. “I wanted to give ye space but I feel like that wasn’t the right choice? Ye seem furious with me and I dinna know what I did, but I get that it’s something and —“

 

“Who are those girls?”

 

“You have a _husband_.”

 

His voice is rough. She feels it snatch her breath and turns away, gripping the balcony rail. There’s a sharp bit and she can’t help but let out a sigh, a little mewl of pain. He instantly straightens, reaches out. It’s instinctive, as age-old as fire and water and mud huts by the river. As ancient as his scent on the wind and her nose lifting to breathe it in, feel it fill her belly. His fingers grasp her hand and he turns it over, examines the long, thin cut on her palm.

 

“You’re hurt,” he says low. His thumb slowly strokes the blood, smears it.

 

“It’s nothing,” she says, can barely get the words out. “It’s _nothing_.”

 

He lifts her hand to his mouth.  She feels the slow drag of his tongue and closes her eyes, closes them against the salt-wet lick of his mouth, the pull of his lips against her skin, as he sucks away the blood. 

 

“It could never be nothing, Caitriona,” Sam says hoarsely, and he walks away, the memory of his mouth against her palm as sure and as blinding and as painful as if he’d fucked her against the rail, against the sky with its falling sun. 


	2. el país grande del sur.

_Big Sur, California_

 

The night is hot black, infinite with stars and the swirls and eddies of constellations. Caitriona sits with her feet curled up beneath her, a balloon glass of wine by her side, a shawl draped over her shoulders, the sky pressing in with its darkness and secrets and whispering rivers of starlight, the mountains with their hushing movements, the owl hoots and wolf cries and the _shhhhhh_  sound of the pine trees with their heavy green boughs. 

 

‘The Cottage’, as its called, is just far enough away from the main lodge at Ventana that she feels as if she’s floating on another planet, the world spread beneath her as alien and new as a comet flung to earth. It is the lights pinpricking through the forest, and the bubble and pop of the hot tub on her deck that remind her she’s not alone in this ocean of wood smells and animal and wide, glittering night.

 

When she lifts her glass to her lips, letting the wine spill down her throat and burn through the chill, she feels the ghostly ache from the just-healed cut on her hand. Remembers the hot pull of tongue, the slight scrape of his teeth. He hasn’t texted. Did not talk to her after the hoarse whisper by the rail. _It could never be nothing, Caitriona_. Her name like a curse.

 

Of course, he’d deigned to snap a quick photograph for the paparazzi, and when she’d seen it later, she had flinched. The space between them, their careful smiles. All so polite, so dignified. Maybe they weren’t as good actors as they’d fancied themselves to be. It was all there, she thought at the time. All there for anyone who cared to look.

 

Earlier, she’d had Nat King Cole playing through her iPhone. _Unforgettable_. It made her throat close up in this embarrassing, utterly cliched way, and she’d wondered how she was going to possibly get herself out of this? Without dragging her nails down the thin skin of their lives, tearing them asunder. Scattering the pieces in her wake. Like a train arrowing across unforgiving track, straight for anyone in its path.

 

And she’d texted T of course. Because the guilt and the throb of her blood sometimes seemed one and the same. He’d replied, said how was Big Sur. She’d said it was good, quiet. She was settling in. All sorts of nonsense. He responded that he was busy with work but he would call her the next day. She’d said that would be fine. He’d said goodnight, and that he loved her, missed her. She said she missed him too.

 

Everything felt like ash in her mouth. They delivered her dinner. She’d asked for a huge salad, and it _was_ quite enormous, even by American standards. A large blue bowl with greens, avocado, fried, pungent goat’s cheese and pickled red onions. They were vibrant and the kind of pink that reminded Caitriona of sunsets. There was a thick lemony dressing and roasted garlic. Pots of chile butter and warm, soft sourdough. She ate everything with glasses of cold white wine. It stole her breath with its iciness. 

 

Afterward, she’d brought out the reds, because why not. She was on hols, by herself, in the wilderness of the California coast, and if any night called for getting off her tits, it was this one. 

 

Her phone vibrates by her side. She almost smiles, thinks maybe he missed her. Dropped the bar's accounting for one moment and dialled her number in a fit of passion.

 

But it’s not her husband. It’s Sam. She stares at the screen for a moment. The photo that she uses for his contact page thrums with every silent ring. It’s a snap of them - which, while she thinks of him as his own person, of course she does - for some reason, they just always feel like a unit in her mind. A unit of _what_ , she’s not quite sure. Maybe never will be. Her whole body seems to hurt as she lets the call go to voicemail. Her own dithering (own cowardice, more like) costing her the chance to hear his voice.

 

“It’s for the best,” she mutters to herself. 

 

But he rings again. And again.

 

On the fourth, she picks up. “You’re persistent.”

 

“Balfe,” he says. His voice is thready. Like he’s been crying, but that can’t be? Surely not.

 

“You okay?”

 

“Right as rain,” he says, lying through his teeth. “You?”

 

“I was sleeping.”

 

“Sorry.”

 

“I wasn’t actually.” She pauses. The stars seem to be listening. “What’s up?”

 

“Can’t I call for no reason?”

 

“Not really. I mean, not lately. In Scotland, sure but—“

 

“Yer really making me feel like a shite over this hiatus,” he says.

 

“If you’d like, I can hang up and you can—“

 

“I’m just kidding, don’t be so sensitive.”

 

Caitriona breathes in slowly. “Is there a reason for this call, Heughan?”

 

He clears his throat. “I thought we left things a bit— well. Awkwardly.”

 

“Just a bit.”

 

“I’m sorry for leaving so— look, I’ve not done things correctly since we left Scotland. I ken that. I just felt like we needed a break. We needed to think on things. You needed to see your husband and I needed to concentrate on work.”

 

“It sure looked like work.”

 

He chuckles. “You’re giving me attitude, Cait? I’m not the one with a ring on my finger, doll.”

 

“Now who has the attitude?”

 

“I’m just pointing out that it’s not always— Christ, it feels like I’m on trial. And I was trying to do the right fucking thing.”

 

“What’s the right thing?”

 

“Leaving ye to deal with your own life. Your marriage.” He sighs. “And now here we are, I guess.”

 

“I never said I didn’t want to deal with my life, Sam,” she says. “But I thought I’d at least have a text off you. A call or email. I don’t know. I didn’t think you’d just disappear.”

 

“I didn’t—“

 

“You did. I haven’t heard from you in _months_.” Her voice breaks. “We used to talk every day.”

 

“Maybe that was the problem.”

 

“It wasn’t a _problem_ ,” Caitriona snaps. “That’s such a dick thing to say. Fitting for the new Sam, I suppose.”

 

“The new Sam?” he echoes.

 

“Trucker hats and blonde bimbos,” she says acidly, hating herself even before the words leave her lips. Blaming the _women_? God, this isn’t her. “I guess what they say about Los Angeles is true, after all.”

 

“What’s that?” he asks, without any feeling at all.

 

“It’ll make a sinner out of anyone.”

 

“Going to a few parties hardly makes me a sinner, Balfe.”

 

“That’s not all you’ve been doing.”

 

“Aye and how would ye know?"

 

“I wouldn’t.” She feels tired, like she could sleep for winters, summers. “But I can guess.”

 

“Oh, and what would ye guess then?”

 

“I’d guess you’re fucking that — well, whoever that was.”

 

“Amy—“

 

“Not the pool girl.” Cait realizes how ridiculous this sounds. But she can’t stop herself. “The other one. She’s … pointy? Desperate-looking.”

 

He sounds like he’s shifting. Skin against sheets, maybe? Either way, it sends a hot rush straight to her belly and she uncurls her legs from beneath her. Sits up straight and swigs the wine straight from the bottle. He finally speaks, and his voice is tight, constrained.

 

“What did ye _expect_? You and I kissed _once_. It was nice, but I wasn’t going to just stop being a man because you admitted your cunt gets wet for me occasionally.”

 

Caitriona hangs up. She does it without conscious thought, without even taking a breath. When the phone vibrates again, she picks it up and fairly spits out the words. 

 

“You bloody disgusting arsehole, I—“

 

“I’m all of those things. I didn’t— fucking _Christ_ , I didn’t mean to say that. Ye made me mad but that’s no excuse—“

 

“ _I_ made _you_ mad? What the —“

 

Sam laughs, but there’s no humour in it. None of the joy she remembers. “Questioning my sex life. Shit, Balfe, I don’t ask about you and Tony, do I? I wouldn’t. It would be wrong. So why do ye get to ask me about that?”

 

She thinks. The buzz behind her eyes quietens and she presses her forehead against her palm. “I don’t. I’m just… I was shellshocked.”

 

“Because I’ve stayed a virgin for all intents and purposes. Since we met.” He pauses and his voice softens. “I’m sorry for what I said. Ye didn’t deserve that. No matter the questions. But I can’t help but feel like you’re forgetting that I — I get lonely. Just like anyone else. I make silly decisions. Maybe I let her suck my cock—“ she flinches — “ but so fucking what? I came away from filming like a mad man. Just wanting to do something, anything, to forget. Do ye think I didn’t miss you once we left Scotland? Do you think I didn’t miss your flat and our dinners and getting ye coffee and joking with you and hearing ye laugh? Do you think I didn’t miss that so much it _hurt_? And do ye think I didn’t realize just how wrong that was? To miss your smile and your smell and the way ye look at me sometimes, like we have our own private language and our own private life — when I know full well we don’t. We can’t.”

 

Her blood hammers in her body. “I don’t…”

 

But he continues, “And I know it’s terrible, Caitriona, to want to take ye away from him and to want ye all to myself, when you’re never going to be _that_ but I was just sitting here earlier, wondering where things have gone so fucking tits up, and I missed you and all I wanted was to hear your voice. _That_  is why I called. Since you asked. Because I couldn’t go one more second without hearing your voice.”

 

“That can’t be true.”

 

“Why not?”

 

“Because you haven’t called me in months.”

 

“Why do ye think I’ve been making an arse of myself all over this city if not to keep from ringing you?”

 

She can’t help but smile. “Oh.”

 

“Where are you?”

 

“Why does that matter?”

 

He huffs. “Just answer the question, Balfe.”

 

“Where are _you_?”

 

“Los Angeles. Hotel room.” His tone is flat. “You next.”

 

“Big Sur.”

 

“The big country of the South.”

 

“Eh?”

 

“It’s what the Spanish called Big Sur before it became well, Big Sur, I ‘spose. It’s got wicked hiking. I’ve always wanted to visit.”

 

“It’s beautiful,” she says quietly. “Why are you in a hotel room?”

 

“Contemplating life,” he says. “Is Tony with you?”

 

She breathes in sharply. “Does that matter?”

 

“It might.”

 

“No.”

 

“Aye, okay then.” He stops for a moment and then she can hear him moving. “What’s yer hotel called?”

 

“Why?”

 

“Would ye stop being so argumentative.”

 

“No.”

 

“I’m going to come and see you. I’ll book my own room of course but— we need to talk. In person.”

 

“We already did that.”

 

“Without Hollywood at our heels,” he says, low. “Without anyone else there. I need to just— we need to work things out, Caitronia. Hiatus’ll be over before we know it and I don’t want things to be as awkward as they’ve been. Text me your hotel.”

 

“It’s a resort,” she says lamely, unable to think of anything else to come back with.

 

“Fancy. So ye will?”

 

Caitriona stares up at the cosmos. She balances the phone against her shoulder, lifts her arms up as if to pull in the night, the sky, the sounds and the wilds and the trees. The mountains and the roar of the surf. The hikes he wants to take and the big country, the little country, the valleys of her heart and of their hearts. The space between them and the space that will not be between them. Their bodies and their pulsing souls and their pulsing hearts. His face, here, his eyes, blazing, the sweat of him and his arms and his t-shirts and the way he looks at her, really properly _looks_. 

 

“ _Yes_ ,” she says, just once. In answer, to everything. 


	3. you wicked, wild, wreckless thing.

_Big Sur, California._

"Oi, that was right in my alley, Balfe!"

 

She squints at him across the court, sweating, furious and faintly exhilarated in a way she hasn't been since leaving Scotland, leaving the wilds. The blood is rushing through her veins like lakes joining into rivers, and there is salt running down her back, her tummy, behind her hairline. He's standing with his hands on his hips, tennis racket at the ready. A stickler for the rules, and an irritating dickhead to boot.

 

She smiles sweetly. "Then I suppose you get a point."

 

"I 'spose I do too," Sam says. "Ye weren't trying to cheat, were ye?"

 

"Never," she says through gritted teeth. "But normally I play for fun? Y'know, not so much--"

 

"I only play to win, lass," he returns, serving the ball. "Thought you would've been the same to be honest."

 

Caitriona smashes it back across the net. "You really have no idea who you're dealing with."

 

Sam grins widely and rallies. "Christ, I hope not."

 

He'd arrived that morning, knocking on her door with a sheepish smile. It belied the blaze in his eyes, the look that pinned her in place, even as she stood in the foyer of the cottage, bleary from sleep, the air smelling of wine and the tang of chlorine from the hot tub. There was a bunch of wildflowers in his hand, purples and pinks and yellows. A whirling contusion of colour. 

 

"I --" she faltered, noticing his bags. "Aren't you-- where's your room?"

 

"They're still getting it ready. Can I just drop these here till then?"

 

"Of course not," she said in her best Hermione Granger voice. "Leave them outside to rot."

 

When he laughed, his whole face changed. She'd noticed it before, but never so fully until that moment, when she'd been so long without it. It made him look younger, more boyish. She was able to picture him racing through fields and splashing through the river she knew ran behind his parents' old property in New Galloway. His hair would have been that colour it was when they first met. Burnt butter. Her throat closed a bit and she looked at him, standing there, waiting - or _expecting_ \- and the walls of the cottage felt too close, too hot and contained. 

 

So she did what she did best. She acted. 

 

"Let's play tennis."

 

He blinked at her. But it was clear he wasn't keen to have 'the talk' any more than she was. "Tennis, aye? Are ye ready for me to wipe the floor with you?"

 

She couldn't help but roll her eyes. "We've established I'm better than you at most things, Sam."

 

It turns out, however, that she'd been wrong. About that, at least. Though Caitriona fancies herself a bit of a Williams sister, she is  _not._ Not even close. It seemed she'd been lulled into complacency through all the games with Maril, who wasn't _bad_ per se, but obviously not quite up to Heughan standard.

 

As they sit afterward by the court, sipping companionably from bottles of water, she thinks that despite her wounded pride, she quite enjoyed watching him play. Liked watching him so intent and concentrated in his movements. Liked watching the way he instinctively knew how to spot her weaknesses, and act on them. Like a predator scenting his prey in the barren desert. 

 

And to see him lift his t-shirt to wipe his sweat-damp face. The juts of his hipbones and the arrow of hair disappearing beneath his shorts. She wonders if he watched her too. Wonders if he thought about the taste of her in his mouth. The cut down her palm and the suck of his tongue. She wonders if the cupboard doors she had sealed over her heart are started to warp beneath the pressure, unlock and open. 

 

"That was aces," Sam says.

 

"A matter of opinion," Caitriona replies tartly. 

 

"Ye really can't stand to lose."

 

"This isn't about winning or losing," she says. "It's about not playing with a cheating arsehole."

 

"So you're admitting ye cheat. That's the first step with any problem, you know."

 

She clocks his shoulder with hers. "Ha ha."

 

He chuckles and looks down. "Let's go, Balfe."

 

"Where?"

 

He shows her. They drive up to the coast in his rental car. Higher and higher into the hills, along roads that always travel by the ocean, as if following it - like a lover would - into the horizon. It's quiet and still, broken only by rushes of cloud and birds, the odd deer, feasting on knots of grass. And forever, and ever, alongside them, the Pacific. The most brilliant and hurting of blues. She thinks of that quote. _They say it has no memory._ Fathoms deep and as ancient as the idea of stepping through looking glasses or princesses bloodying their fingers on spindles and thorn.

 

Looking at him, and everything surrounding them, she feels again the bursts of unwelcome happiness - incandescence, just as she did on that hill in Scotland. By the monument that urged them to seize the day, live for the moment. Her feet aching in heels and his smiles coming so easily - as they did back then, before Loch Rannoch. Before she ruined everything by stupidly telling the truth. Or at least part of it. She didn't say it all, didn't say what she'd been able to taste in her mouth, like food or drink. As tangible as something to be swallowed.  _I think I'm in love with you._

 

He glances at her. His eyes crinkle at the corners as he grins. "Shall we stop soon? I got them to pack a picnic."

 

"What's with you and picnics?"

 

"Who wouldn't like a basket full of food?"

 

"Fair play, can't think of anyone."

 

They park in a lay-by and hike over the bluffs until they come to a place where they can see the ocean. It feels so close that Caitriona fancies the spray from the crashing waves mists her face, alights like fireflies on her eyelashes. Sam sets down a blanket and begins to unpack the picnic, looking for all the world like a boy who's never had a square meal. She watches him tenderly, amused and sore and tired, and she wishes she could let it all show on her face, wishes she could unzip herself for him, so he'd _know._

 

He'd know it was more than just sex, just a kiss or desire or anything so fleeting - so _small_. More than just getting coffees or play-acting at being star-crossed lovers. More than anything she'd ever known or dreamt of.

 

But could she?

 

And would he _want_ her to?

 

He looks up and cocks one eyebrow. "Staying for a bit, Balfe?"

 

"Depends on what you brought."

 

He laughs again. He hasn't sounded so happy in ages, and her heart - stupid, stupid - it swells. Threatens to spill over like the hills of salt below. His voice is low, and he looks down, setting out napkins, plates. "You're quite greedy, ye know."

 

"Always," she says, unable to keep herself from trembling.

 

"Sit down and let me feed ye then."

 

It's one of those perfectly Californian feasts that don't exist elsewhere. Little ramekins filled with fried goat's cheese, layered with slices of sunblushed tomatoes, chives and chili-infused oil. A pot of marinated pink shrimp, and another of greasy kalamata olives. Sliced avocado, as green as a shamrock. Fluffy, perfectly handmade corn tortilla chips, still warm and sprinkled with rock salt. Ventana's own salsa, bright with coriander and tomatillos. Garlicky, buttery bread, and caramelized brussels sprouts, sweet and a bit salty and tangly. On the side, Sam brings out pots of tahini-rich hummus, fried mushrooms, and fat strips of pickled jalapenos, stinging and juicy. 

 

"I don't actually know where to start."

 

He winks. "And ye thought I'd let you starve?"

 

"No," she says, accepting the glass of bubbly wine. "I knew you wouldn't."

 

His eyes go a bit dark, and she ducks her head, distracting herself with food. They eat in silence for long moments, just letting the air wash over them, sweet and pure, and the birds call overhead, shrieking to their mates, their wings slashes of dark against the sky. It's all so, so good, and she groans, lying back, shifting only to sip the wine and let its heat glow in her throat, her belly. 

 

"So you got that film, I heard."

 

"How did you...?"

 

He shrugs. "My agent. I'm proud of you. I'd have texted, but, well."

 

"Thanks. It's exciting. Jodie Foster, and all. She's actually legit."

 

He chuckles. "My thoughts exactly. Do you think that's what you'll do after the show finishes? Films, I mean?"

 

"I don't know. I can't imagine doing television again," Caitriona muses. The sun is warm and soft on her face. "At least not one with such a brutal schedule."

 

"With ye there," he pauses, "and nothing would be the same, I think? Like, it's never going to have the same type of synergy."

 

"I know," she whispers sleepily. "It couldn't."

 

"I went to Canada," he says, without inflection. "Just overnight, I mean. A little bit ago. To visit my Dad's grave."

 

"Oh--"

 

He waves his hand. "Don't-- I mean, ye don't have to say anything-- I just wanted to tell you. It felt strange not telling ye, so I am. I thought it would give me some sort of... well, closure's a bollocks word but ye know what I mean. Some kind of ending or whatever."

 

"And did it?"

 

"What do you think?" he asks, half-smiling. "'Course not. I went there to talk to him but I just-- I thought about how I hadn't really understood him, not really. How he was his own person, and had so many thoughts and dreams that I'd never know. I just wish I'd asked. Or had the time to ask."

 

"We don't get a lot of time, do we," she whispers, and reaches up to touch him. The bend of his elbow, where the skin is tender and secret. But his next words stop her, and her fingers drift back to the blanket. 

 

"I should have texted you. I shouldn't have let things fester like they did. It just ends up with me calling ye in a right state in the middle of the night."

 

"You seemed sad."

 

"Properly gutted," he says quietly, looking out over the waves. "But I haven't felt quite myself for a while. Not since-- well, if ye want to know, since I returned your key."

 

"It's still there."

 

"What?"

 

She doesn't open her eyes. "It's still there. I haven't moved it."

 

"Waiting for me, is it?"

 

"Yes."

 

Sam breathes in. "Ye say these things and I-- I can't help but wonder if ye lied. Back in Scotland."

 

Her stomach cramps. "About what?"

 

"About the kiss being about your marriage. I wonder if it was more about us."

 

Caitriona unfolds herself and stands, moving to the edge of the bluff. It's as if the sun will split her open and let light in those darknesses, let the ocean in every hollow and dip of her bones, the salt and the mermaids and the seakings. She opens her arms wide, as if in acceptance.

 

"You did that once before," Sam says hoarsely. He's unmoving, watching her. "At Loch Rannoch. Before we kissed."

 

"And what did you think, then? That I was mad?"

 

"Aye, but I more thought how mad I was _about_ you, Caitriona."

 

She stills, letting her arms drop.

 

He continues. "That hasn't changed. It never did. It's why I couldn't ring you. Didn't want to chance what I might say. But I'm giving in a bit, I think. Coming here."

 

"Are you?" she whispers, and turns. Their eyes meet, and lock. Something goes through her then, like a sweet hook, pulling at her all the way down.

 

"Aye. It's why--" he pauses and the hook tightens, hurts, raw and insistent. "It's why I lied to you, Cait. I didn't book my own room."

 


	4. body, laid in that white rush.

****_Big Sur, California._

 

She casts her eyes downward, toward the tussocks of grass. The wild roses, with their thorns and lushness. If she ran her fingers over the petals, would they come away blushed with blood? All around them, the vibrations and roar from the surf below. So powerful that each crash is like a mini-earthquake, reverberating through their bodies. Caitriona speaks then, carefully. Her heart, that she sealed so tightly, it is cracking - she can hear it. But she can't allow it to break open, not completely, not until she's certain.  

 

"I'm not sure I should be stood on a cliff's edge for this talk."

 

He laughs, startled. "Oh, aye?"

 

"Why didn't you book your own room, Sam?"

 

"Why do ye think?"

 

"I'm married."

 

" _Are_ you?"

 

Even she has to grin at that. "Ha bloody ha."

 

"I'm funny," he says serenely. But he isn't looking at her, and she thinks that speaks louder than words ever could. "We promised we'd talk, didn't we Cait?"

 

"Yes."

 

"I miss--" he pauses and his forehead scrunches a bit. He worries his lower lip between his teeth. "I miss being mates."

 

_Oh._

 

She sits down, because - well, because she can't stand up, and so she rests there, far from him, on the sun-flushed earth. The dirt beneath her is as old as anything could ever be. Here it has sat, and here it will sit, until she is dust. She touches it then, this primordial ooze, and looks directly at him. Her stomach is a hot stone, and she isn't sure what she will say until she says it.

 

"I miss it too."

 

"Do ye?" his face lightens, and he leans back, resting his head on his arms. Opening himself to the sky, just as she had before they kissed by the loch. Watching the ospreys soar above the water. Rain tasting like metal on her lips. It feels like years ago, epochs.  "I ken that I was the one who-- well, I got quite arsey with ye at that restaurant when Tony visited."

 

His name, spoken _here_. The black tide of guilt rushes on the horizon. Caitriona swallows and contemplates that. How far is she willing to swim before she has to turn back? Before she makes herself sick? Before she destroys everything else around her? Piece by piece, brick by brick.

 

"You were--"

 

"Jealous as fuck," he finishes for her. 

 

"You reminded me I had a husband."

 

"And that hasn't changed. But we have."

 

"Have we?" her throat aches, but not with tears. 

 

"Aye, I think so. I want to still be mates -- I want us to get back what we had. We can't go back to Glasgow and be like... well, like _this_."

 

"But what _is_ this?" she asks, because she can't not.

 

"I feel like-- I feel like what we have is separate. It's just for us. I dinna know if that makes sense, but it can't be anything that's shared with other people. They can't know what we've done or felt-- they've never had this kind of mad experience like we've had. Thrown together into this -- well, this forced intimacy."

 

"Such a grown-up word, Heughan."

 

"Ye underestimate me," he says. "I didn't listen to you in your flat-- I didn't listen to what ye were trying to say. I was just pissed off and confused, I spose. I wanted to throttle ye because it felt like-- like ye weren't facing what had actually happened. Sometimes I think yer Mum was right -- you're like a locked cupboard."

 

"If you're agreeing with my Mum, we have issues beyond--"

 

"Calm your tits Balfe. I'm just saying that I think I overreacted -- not seeing things from your perspective. After all, I didn't come into this with a ring on my finger. Didn't come into it with _any_ relationships at all, save a few fuck buddies."

 

She almost chokes. " _Abs_ , I presume?"

 

"Ah, you remember." His voice is amused. "Thought ye might be a wee bit jealous, even then."

 

Caitriona feels as if she's re-calibrating, for lack of a better term. He's so... casual. So _assured._ She wonders, is this what swanning over Los Angeles does to a person? Should she have moped less, and drank more? Should she have hooked up with a few blondes (not a bad idea, actually) and bought a trucker hat (no) and went to parties that stank of sweat and booze and sperm (fuck no). He's _changed_ and she's struggling to reconcile this Sam with the Sam she knew. The Sam that came to her flat, uncertain. His hand shaking as he placed the key on the table by the door. 

 

"I wasn't."

 

"Okay Pinocchio," he says. 

 

"What's your point then?" she asks testily.

 

"I want to fuck you."

 

God, the way he says it. Without preamble or artifice. His voice is low, dark. The words go right through her. She feels them at every point where she throbs. Where she's throbbed since she met him, since she saw him across a restaurant. The sensitive flesh at her inner elbows. Her nipples. The hollow at the base of her neck. Her tummy, almost like a cramp, but not quite. Her pussy. Everything branches, like sweet stinging lightning.

 

He continues, without sitting up. Without looking at her. His words travel across the air between them, competing with the waves, the birdcalls. "I think ye know that though. I think ye always have. But I wanted to say it, it felt important to say it." He pauses. "Let me show ye something, Balfe."

 

"Is this a dick thing or..."

 

He chuckles, and the tension splits slightly, just a little. A river of respite. He gets up, brushing off his shorts. Placing a few rocks over the picnic basket, he picks up the blanket and the wine. 

 

"Gutter-minded to the last, Cait."

 

"That makes two of us then, doesn't it."

 

He gestures for her to stand, to follow him. She does, because what other choice does she have? He walks with her along the bluff a ways, until they come to a break in the rock, and a small path opens up, hidden from the road, from any cars or hikers. It winds down, down, down, toward the endless blue. Sam goes first, leading her. He keeps his body angled in a way that she senses is meant to be protective, to stop her from stumbling or falling. It reminds her of the way he helps her from cars, or keeps his hand close to her lower back. Always there, like another skin.

 

As they get lower, the wind ceases its howling, and the air begins to smell of brine and salt. It's as sharp and marine as the tang of blood. She inhales deeply, gorging herself on that ancient scent. As old as mermaids or ships lost at sea.

 

After a few moments, the path ends abruptly at a little slice of beach, the sand golden-dark from years of drownings at the ruthless hands of the Pacific. It is soft and springy beneath her feet, and she takes her shoes off, tossing them to the side. The beach is sheltered by cliffs but everything feels as white as piano keys with sunshine and the ribbon of creamy tide. Flowering branches tumble down the bluffs, all around them, filling her mouth with the scent of thousands of petals, crushed and battered by the winds. So sweet, even in death.

 

She lifts her face to the sky again, like a sunflower seeking its food.

 

"A beauty, isn't it?"

 

She nods dreamily. "How did you find it?"

 

"I was road tripping," he says, shucking off his own trainers and wading into the little tidal pools. "Doing a bit of hiking--"

 

" _You_?"

 

"Ha bloody ha," he echoes dryly. "Hilarious as ever, Balfe."

 

"I'm funny," she says, giving him back the gift.

 

A half-smile appears on his lips, a ghost from their shared past. Mates, costars, keyholders and Netflix watchers. It spills around them, the history and the memories and what could be, what can never be. His voice is a bit rough, but he answers her. "I've always thought so too."

 

"Go on, finish your story."

 

"It's not exactly a tale worthy of Gabaldon--"

 

"Thank god or we'd be here till next Christmas."

 

He smirks. "I was just hiking and I found it. I came back loads of times and there was never anyone else here, so-- it became like my place, I 'spose? I could surf or suntan or whatever else, and I was never bothered. A seagull stole my lunch once, but I reckon I deserved that, leaving it out an' all. I've been back a few times--"

 

"With numerous conquests, I'm sure."

 

Sam turns and looks at her. "Are ye, then?"

 

She falters a little. His gaze is so naked, and she can see everything in his eyes, the skies reflected back. The world on his face. "I was just--"

 

"You seem to think I'm a slut."

 

"Aren't you?"

 

He considers that and his eyes narrow. "I've never brought anyone here besides you. And my stolen lunch. So does that answer yer question?"

 

Caitriona flushes and kicks at the sand. She turns away from him, facing the ocean, the long row of cliffs extending down and down, neverending and neverstopping, a spool of juts and formations and salt roughened rock. So alien and beautiful that they look flung down from space. It reminds her then, of their finite time, that chances not taken are snatched up by the universe. 

 

"I want us to still be mates," he says again, from behind her.

 

"I do too."

 

His palms cup her elbows. She's spun back in time, to her tiny kitchen in Scotland. After the party, when they came so close. Teetering on the precipice. She breathes out, shuddering. Just at that small touch. His hands, callused from training, the gym, the sword fighting and the practicing. Thinks of a poem she read once. The painting, as dark and as gorgeous as a nightmare.  _Leda and the Swan_. The girl, caught and snared. Burning, burning, beneath feathers and white. 

 

"Turn around," he says.

 

"If I do, we won't be mates any more."

 

"Aye, we will," he says, lowering his mouth to a whisper above her shoulder, where she is bare and tender. "We just have to keep this between us."

 

"But--my--"

 

"No one can know," he says hoarsely. "No one has to know. But I-- I can't -- you're driving me _mad,_ Caitriona."

She does it, then. Lets her head fall back. Until the nape of her neck rests against his shoulder and his mouth presses against the skin there, at the part where there is a little bump from her collarbone. It's fragile and so sensitive that she gasps a bit, and he groans at the sound of that, of her desire. He drags his lips up the side of her neck and she feels the rasp of his stubble, feels his teeth close over her ear lobe.

 

"I brought ye here to seduce you," he says.

 

"I know," Caitriona replies, turning around and taking his mouth with hers.

 

Sam growls a bit, low in his throat, and his hands come up, tearing her ponytail holder and letting her hair whip around them, a dark and wild wind. He tastes of jalapenos and he hurts her mouth, the most delicious, important hurt, and she wants to feel that all over her. The burn of his tongue and the burn of his cock and the burn of his hands, and she grapples with his shirt, pulling it over his head, running her palms over his shoulders, his back, the dips where his muscles wing out. The shape of him, so familiar and yet - she's never felt him as Caitriona. Never let herself feel him as anyone but Claire.

 

They stumble a bit as he pulls her over, toward the blanket. When they fall, she's on top of him, but he rolls her over right away, getting up on his elbows and looking down at her.

 

"I've--" he swallows, and she can see his throat working. "I think I've dreamt about this."

 

She thinks of her own dreams. The dark woods. The running, panting. The wolves and the silent figure.

 

"I think I have too."

 

The first time _his_ mouth pulls at her nipples, Caitriona's back bows up. It's as if there is a cord from her breasts and it ripples through her body to her pussy, snapping taut every time his lips suck or his teeth scrape or his tongue flicks out. He smiles against her breasts as she moans out, unable to stop herself. Her fist comes up to her mouth but he tears it away.

 

"No, make noise. Fucking _moan_ for me, Cait."

 

"No I--"

 

"There's no one around. I want to hear ye," he says, his accent thick with his own desire.

 

His hand covers her pussy, fully, grinding down. His skin is hot, and she is slippery wet. She can _hear_ herself, how wet she is, and she blushes. Her legs open for him, and he fucks two fingers inside of her, those fingers she's stared at, wondered about, wondered how they'd feel. The calluses on his thumbs and forefingers. The red marks on his knuckles. Every rough bit, every hurt and scrape, it's _inside_ and she can _feel_ , she _knows_ the hot rush, almost painful with its immediacy.

 

He cups her clit as he begins to move his fingers, and it's almost -- it's too-- it's too _much_. After so many long, blank months, to now be so full, so invaded and taken. Her thoughts start to break into pieces, into hot slices of feeling. Incoherent, animal. She wants to kiss him, tear at him, rake her nails down his back. His mouth closes over her breasts and he sucks, so hard that her nipples stick out in painful relief, begging, throbbing.

 

She's moving up and down on the blanket with the force behind his fucking. Because that's what it is. Almost more intimate than his cock inside of her. She can hear the slap of his palm against her clit, the sucking sounds as her pussy takes him, again and again. Her hands grip the sand at her sides, feeling its heat, and she opens her salt eyes, the tears seeping down the sides of her face, the blue sky above, the sounds he's making, deep in his throat, of hunger and unabashed longing.

 

"Inside me," she breathes out, the words sounding messy, muddied with feeling. "I want-- please--" 

 

"Caitriona," he murmurs against her nipples. They are wet from his mouth, shining with it, as dark and rosy as bruises. 

 

She shimmies against him, yanking at his shorts and boxer-briefs until they are half-way down his ass. His cock juts out, painfully hard and thick. He looks down at her, his eyes blazing. She pulls him up, kissing him, tasting herself. The bare sides of her knees brush against his hips. He braces himself with one hand and with the other, grasps his dick, stroking it once - as if he can't help himself. He's already damp, and she can see that one maddening, delicious vein, throbbing like her nipples, heavy with blood.

 

Slowly, agonizingly, he moves down onto his forearm, and feeds his cock into her until he's rooted to the base, his balls resting against her ass, his pubic hair rasping her clit. She squirms, feeling speared, impaled, crazed. She bucks against him, wanting to beg. And it's as if he hears the silent screams, because he rears back, and then he's _fucking_ her.

 

He's fucking her balanced on one arm and the bunch and ripples of his muscles - she'd never thought about them in quite that way - the strength he has, how he could -- _break her_. With his other hand, he grasps her right leg and lifts it over his shoulder. She cups his ass with her palms, feeling every time he tightens and releases, every slam of his hips, every groan from his throat. Every drop of sweat that rolls down his back. He bends his head, sucking on her overly-sensitized nipples until she's moaning with something akin to pain, something so torturous that she feels as if she will come apart, disintegrate.

 

When he begins to grind with his hips, the hair surrounding his cock - the colour of burnt butter - rasping her clit and the desperate, wet pulls of his mouth against her nipples, she knows. It's as if all the blood in her body, all of the heat and wet, all of the tension and screaming fucking _want_ is gathering together to a single point, like a heart, but between her legs. She feels it beating, like wings against the sky, feels it beating and beating and beating and _Oh God oh God oh_

 

there, beneath the sky, like they have always been - in the wilds and the forests and the lochs and the bluffs, with the Pacific around them and beneath them, with the stars and the ancient rains - with the cosmos exploding above, Caitriona finds it.

 

_Relief._

 


End file.
